Welcome to the 13th Guards Web-Site.
13th Guards are a living history group portraying Soviet Infantry of World War II.
The Great Patriotic War 1941-45
During the early hours of Sunday 22nd June 1941 Germany launched the largest land campaign in world history,"Operation Barbarossa",the invasion of the Soviet Union. To the people of Russia it became to be known as " The Great Patriotic War ", a war conducted without equal,in its dimension,cruelty,degradation and massive cost to human life and suffering!
During the course of the war the Soviet Union mobilized 29,574,900 men and women. Actual wartime turnover amounted to 21,700,000.During the 1,418 days of barbarized warfare the the Red Army's battlefield losses amounted to 11,400,000,killed or missing! The Soviets themselves variously convicted and executed 376,000 for acts of desertion and 422,700 were sentenced to service in penal battalions,assigned to the most dangerous sectors to "atone for their crimes".
The civilian population also suffered greatly under German occupation.Some 16,350,000 citizens were either shot,starved,neglected or murdered in concentration camps! More than two million were deported for slave labour in the Reich.Partisan warfare only compounded the horrors as German retribution was swift and ferocious! The Soviet military and civilian combined death toll was between 27-28 million souls!
Each minute of the war cost the Russians 9-10 lives, each hour 587,each day 14,000.
Campaigns were conducted over vast distances,where huge areas of the front disintergrated,entire armies simply vanished from orders of battle,divisions of 10,000 men were reduced to fighting units of only 250 or less!
The Soviet loss of materials was also high,96,000 tanks,106,400 aircraft and 317,000 guns!
Between 1941-43 the Wehrmacht destroyed almost a third of 570 Soviet rifle divisions.The Red Army finally destroyed,disabled or captured 607 Axis divisions.In comparison the combined Anglo-American armies fighting in North Africa,Italy and Western Europe destroyed 176 enemy divisions!
Almost on a daily basis on the former Eastern Front the remains of a lost soldier are discovered,however
to this day just under 6 million Red Army soldiers,sailors and airmen are still missing and have no known grave or resting place!
13th Guards Rifle Division"Poltavaskaya".
1st Bn. 42nd Guards Rifle Regiment
42nd Guards are a WW2 living history group those aim is as far as authentically possible, to portray the life of the ordinary
infantry soldier within a Red Army rifle division during The Great Patriotic War. We have no political affiliations and no political activity is allowed. Membership is not gender specific and is open to all who are interested in the Eastern Front. We are part of the Northern World War 2 Association and participate at various living history and battle re-enactment events mainly within the Northern region of the UK..
A brief history of the Division during The Great
Patriotic War.
The 13th Guards Division,formerly the 87th Rifle Division saw action throughout The Great Patriotic War.From the invasion of Poland in 1939,The Winter War with Finland 1939-40,the opening campaigns of the invasion of Russia,the Kiev and Kharkov encirclements.In January 1942 the Division was awarded Guards status,an honorific title for service in combat, renamed 13th Guards Rifle Division.
As part of the 62nd Army during the winter of 1942-43,the Division fought at Stalingrad,holding parts of the city centre,the factory district and the strategic hill overlooking the city,the Mamaev Kurgan.Of the 10,000 men of the Division who origanally crossed the Volga river at the beginning of the battle, only between 280-320 survived!
During the summer of 1943 and now part of the 5th Guards Army,the Division was originally part of the reserve for the Kursk salient operations.However they were committed almost immediately to counter the drive of German elite SS Divisions and were present also at Prokhorovkha ,the worlds largest ever tank battle.
The Division also took part in the Kirovograd counter offensive in the Ukraine,and liberated the historic town of Poltava.As a result the unit was awarded the additional honorific title of "Poltavaskaya" in recognition of this hard won action.
As part of the 5th Guards Tank Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front, the Division took part in the Dniepr River crossing
campaign and the drive west through Eastern Europe into the German homeland.
The unit entered Berlin through the southern suburbs,crossing the Teltov Canal and took part in the assault for the city centre right into the heart of theThird Reich!
